From Part-Time Job to Long-Term Career: College Students Explore the Medical Field Through Work-Study Jobs at CHLA

For most college students who benefit from the Federal Work-Study Program, the positions they take on may be only somewhat related to their desired career path. This is especially true for students who are interested in a medical career.

For those students, the work is unlikely to provide experience interacting with doctors, nurses, or other medical providers. A few years ago, Juliet Emamaullee, MD, PhD, FRCSC, FACS, physician and Research Director of Abdominal Organ Transplantation at CHLA, decided she wanted to change that.

Creating meaningful work-study experiences

“I am a first-generation high school graduate and college student, and when I was in college I had work-study financial aid,” Dr. Emamaullee explains. The Federal Work-Study Program supports young adults from low-income families by providing them with part-time jobs that help pay for their tuition.

“But the work-study jobs I had were not particularly linked to my career goal of becoming a doctor.,” Dr. Emamaullee says. She worked at the front desk of a recreation center and later in a computer lab. One summer, she worked in medical records, but that was the closest her work-study experience came to aligning with her career aspirations.

“Now I’m a researcher with a lab, and it occurred to me a couple of years ago that if I was able to create a work-study position in my research group, it would be a good opportunity for a low-income college student interested in pursuing this type of work,” Dr. Emamaullee says.

To make this idea a reality, Dr. Emamaullee first reached out to the Student Aid Office at USC and discussed the possibility of posting a work-study position for her lab. The office was receptive to the idea and wanted to also offer a couple of similar positions at USC’s Keck School of Medicine.

“We started posting the first few positions on the Friday before Thanksgiving, and we had 30 students from a diverse range of backgrounds apply in about eight days,” Dr. Emamaullee says. “Two students were hired to work in the Clinical Trials Group in the Department of Surgery at Keck, and I hired one into my research lab. Right away, we could see that it was a really positive experience and that there was a huge demand.”

Expanding the program’s scope

To explore the possibility of expanding the program, the university connected Dr. Emamaullee with the Leslie and William McMorrow Neighborhood Academic Initiative (NAI) at USC. The program provides college preparatory classes and enrichment opportunities for sixth- through 12th-grade students from low-income families in neighborhoods near USC. The program has previously collaborated with other CHLA staff members to help inspire L.A. youth of color to pursue careers in medicine and research.

“This whole medical work-study job program was Dr. Emamaullee’s brainchild,” explains Lizette Zarate, EdD, Program Director of the Neighborhood Academic Initiative. Dr. Emamaullee presented her vision of medically focused work-study positions to Dr. Zarate, who realized that it could be a natural fit for the NAI.

“Much of our programming is focused on supporting our participating students through middle school and high school, but we’re always looking for new ways to support our scholars once they’re in college,” Dr. Zarate says. “We want to help them make their way from college to graduate school or to a career, so we saw that this could be a great opportunity to help achieve that goal.”

Dr. Zarate worked with Dr. Emamaullee to figure out the types of additional work-study positions that could be developed, at both the Keck School of Medicine and at CHLA. They also discussed how to gauge and generate interest in these types of jobs among NAI participants. “We hosted our first informational session in the fall of 2023, inviting our NAI scholars who were USC students, and we had a great turnout,” Dr. Zarate says. “We didn’t target any particular major or specific year in school—we just invited our scholars who have work-study financial aid to come eat pizza and hear about potential work-study opportunities at Keck and CHLA. About 30 kids showed up.”

Following this initial informational session, the NAI Scholars/Federal Work-Study Program officially launched during the second half of the 2023-2024 academic year, with over 60 available work-study jobs for students. “We sent out the job postings through the Health Sciences newsletter at USC and were able to match 37 students with work-study positions,” Dr. Emamaullee explains.

As the program begins its second year in January 2025, over 50 health-related work-study positions have been created and filled between USC’s campus and CHLA. More than 90% of the students who took part in these work-study jobs last year have been offered a return job offer, and Dr. Emamaullee has had the chance to present about the program’s achievements at the 2024 American College of Surgeons Clinical Congress. She hopes to continue growing the program in the years to come.

Exploring pediatrics and shadowing researchers

One of the students who has benefitted from this program is Brenda Barrios Yoc, a current senior at USC who has been a part of the NAI since she was in fifth grade. “I attended NAI programs during middle school and high school, and they helped me with the process of applying to college,” Brenda explains. A first-generation college student, Brenda was accepted to USC and started out as a psychology major, but quickly decided to switch her major to health and human sciences to explore a potential career in medicine.

She eventually attended one of the informational panels hosted by the NAI Scholars/Federal Work-Study Program and filled out a survey saying that she was interested in a work-study job in the medical field. “I was actually matched with a position at CHLA, and though I had not specifically been looking at a career in pediatrics before that, I wanted to explore it as a possibility,” Brenda says. She interviewed and landed the position, starting in January of 2024.

Brenda’s position was part of the research team in Critical Care Medicine led by Anoopindar Bhalla, MD. After some initial training in medical research practices, Brenda had the chance to shadow research coordinators on the team to learn about how research is conducted at CHLA and how research study participants are consented. "My work mainly involves pipetting and collecting biological samples, processing them, and assisting with data collection and organization,” she explains.

Brenda has also had the chance to shadow Dr. Bhalla herself and to discuss conducting research and working as a pediatrician. “I’ve shadowed Dr. Bhalla throughout her daily routine and have gained an understanding of what a pediatric doctor’s life really looks like,” she says.

As she spent time at CHLA and learned more about the different specialties within pediatric medicine, she developed an interest in occupational therapy, supporting children to accomplish everyday tasks. “I have realized that I ultimately want to become a pediatric occupational therapist and do research-based work related to occupational therapy, which I have mentioned to Dr. Bhalla,” Brenda says. “She has been very encouraging of this and helpful in terms of working with me to eventually publish an abstract.”

A new path

Since starting her job at CHLA, Brenda has added an occupational therapy minor to her health and human sciences major at USC—a career path she had never even considered before working at CHLA. She is also continuing her work-study job in Dr. Bhalla’s lab at CHLA this year and hopes to keep working at the hospital beyond her graduation.

For students like Brenda, Dr. Emamaullee’s goal of providing college students from low-income families with medical employment experience through work-study positions has been realized. “I can be a shy and introverted person, but this support from CHLA and the NAI has encouraged me to push through any difficulties or challenges that I encounter to be able to grow and take advantage of opportunities,” Brenda explains. “I was worried during my first year of college about not knowing where I would end up, but this job has really guided me to a career path that I’m passionate about—a path that, a year ago, I didn’t see myself pursuing. I’m so grateful for that.”